How to Write Like a Writer: A Sharp and Subversive Guide to Ignoring Inhibitions, Inviting Inspiration, and Finding Your True Voice

(Paperback)

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TheNew York Timesbestselling author of the beloved classicHow to Read Literature Like a Professorteaches you how to write everything from a report for your community association to a meaningful memoir in this masterful and engaging guide.

Combing anecdotes and hard-won lessons from decades of teaching and writingand invoking everyone from Hemingway to your third-grade teacherretired professor Thomas C. Foster guides you through the basics of writing. WithHow to Write Like a Writeryoull learn how to organize your thoughts, construct first drafts, and (not incidentally) keep you in your chair so that inspiration can come to visit.

With warmth and wit, Foster shows you how to get into (and over) your best self, how to find your voice, and how to know when, if ever, a piece of work is done.

Packed with enlightening anecdotes, highlighted with lists and bullet points, this invaluable guide reveals how writers work their magic, and reminds us that we allfor better or worse, whether we mean to or notare known by what we put on paper or screen, both our thoughts and our words.

Reviews

Foster [] offers in this friendly guide practical advice on developing a voice and writing like you mean it. Publishers Weekly Foster brings his experience as a teacher and writer to this genial guide to the writing process. Kirkus Reviews "A writing guide that digs below thesis, punctuation, paragraphs, and sentence structure to offer a philosophical view of the art of written communication." New York Journal of Books Thomas C. Fostermust have been the sort of memorable college professor whose classes filled up fast with long-waiting lists. Fortunately, he has written this bright, positive and helpful work . . . . This is truly an inspired writing manual for everyman. Writing can be a struggle but this slender volume can offer fine assistance in making it better. BookTrib

Author Bio

Thomas C. Foster, author of How to Read Literature Like a Professor and Reading the Silver Screen, is professor emeritus of English at the University of Michigan, Flint, where he taught classes in contemporary fiction, drama, and poetry, as well as creative writing and freelance writing. The author of several books on 20th-century British and Irish literature and poetry.